Ideas
John Bolton Will Not End Well
Wait until Trump starts working with this swamp veteran with bad press and Pentagon push-back who likes to name-drop Edmund Burke.
Ideas
Yemen Shows Why US Needs to Change Its Arms Sales Policy
A Senate resolution to reduce U.S. participation in Yemen's war failed, but policymakers seeking to reduce complicity in the humanitarian crisis have another option.
Ideas
Five Myths About Pentagon Weapons Programs
As the service secretaries converge on Capitol Hill to talk acquisition reform, it’s important to sort fact from fiction.
Ideas
The Iraq War and the Inevitability of Ignorance
The U.S. is destined to keep overlearning the lessons of the last conflict.
Ideas
On Torture, America Must Reckon with More than Gina Haspel
From allies’ mistrust to the fate of the 9/11 detainees, the U.S. legacy of atrocity still corrodes national security.
Ideas
There Are More and More Threats that Militaries Can't Stop. People's Forces Can Help
Populations are not fragile flowers – far from it. Treating them as a national-security resource can boost a society's resiliency, and even its deterrence.
Ideas
Telling the Truth About CIA Torture
Trump’s nominee to lead the agency should answer a number of tough questions about her role in its now-defunct “enhanced interrogation” program.
Ideas
Team of Sycophants
Tillerson’s dismissal leaves the White House more than ever the conniving and dishonest court of an erratic, ill-informed, and willful monarch.
Ideas
Why Did Trump Fire Tillerson Now?
The specific timing of the move—following the secretary of state’s split from the president to condemn a Russian attack in the U.K.—raises questions about its motive.
Ideas
The US Navy Should Start Weaning its Reactors off Bomb-Grade Uranium
Most of the world's reactors use low-enriched uranium. There are at least three good reasons the U.S. fleet should as well.
Ideas
Putin Says Russia’s New Weapons Can’t Be Beat. With AI and Robotics, They Can.
Instead of single interceptors rising to meet an enemy missile, think about swarms of sub-launched UAVs armed with explosives, sensors, and brains.
Ideas
How Postponing a Wargame Helped Create a Diplomatic Opening
Delaying Foal Eagle 2018 made an underappreciated contribution toward the first meeting of U.S. and North Korean heads of state.
Ideas
The Administration Must Explain Its Use-of-Force Theories. Today.
That's not just a good idea; it's the law. A report to Congress is due on Monday.
Ideas
A Trump-Kim Summit: 'Why the Hell Not?'
Direct talks between America’s and North Korea’s heads of state have never been tried, and nothing else has worked.
Ideas
Foreign Governments Are Funneling Money into Trump's Hotels. We Still Don't Know How Much.
The Trump Organization’s response to the problem of foreign governments trying to curry favor with the president is an empty gesture.
Ideas
Trump Risks Trading Away the US-South Korean Alliance
Kim Jong Un is offering a deal at a price that could be way too high—and that the president could easily accept.
Ideas
What's There to Talk About With North Korea?
Kim Jong Un wants to talk to Trump and pause nuclear and missile tests—but the line between diplomacy and brinkmanship isn't that simple.
Ideas
Let the Korean Breakthrough Run Its Course
The new round of talks can only succeed if the Trump administration resists its own worst impulses.
Ideas